$28K Savings Challenge.....November Update

Every year I keep a close eye on our monthly expenses and our monthly income.

Our income is mainly the salary my Hubs draws from his job.  We have money taken off each paycheck from the top to put into savings, before we even get our hands on it.  This money that's taken goes into various pots....life insurance, health insurance premiums, long term care insurance premiums, investments and retirement savings.  It's automatic so we are never tempted to NOT put it into savings or these other categories.

Once the automatic savings amounts, plus taxes and medical/dental/vision premiums are taken out, it leaves what we get to "live on".  From this amount we budget for bills, both monthly and irregular bills(semi-annual, annual etc.) and our variable bills(like food, eating out, clothing  etc.)  Anything left over once our monthly expenses are paid, I put aside into an interest bearing Savings Challenge account.

For 2015 I am continuing my Yearly Savings Challenge.  I am raising the Goal amount slightly to $28,000 this year, $4K more than my goal for last year.

On to the November report.....

I have posted my November End of Month $28K $AVING$ CHALLENGE Totals.
Check out the Savings Challenge page tab at the top of the blog for the specific numbers HERE.

I have 2 goals each month.....
The 1st is to actually finish each month in the black and not the red.
The 2nd is to hit the targeted savings amount of $2,333.33.

I have to report that we finished up November with a Large amount leftover.
The extra amount we ended the month of November with?.......$4362.03

Income

We had $4085.11 left over from our income after our monthly expenses were deducted.

Other monies received in November totaled $276.92.  This included interest made on non-retirement accounts and blogging revenue.

This brought us to our gain of $4,362.03
Since we have no debt, this goes into savings.

Outgo

As for the expenses this November, here are the good and the bad side of things....

HERE are the GOOD THINGS

*  Phone charges and internet were approximately the same as last month.
*  The cash withdrawals were the same amount as in October.
*  The water bill was down another $8.38 from October.
*  The electric bill was only up $39.97 from last month.  With electric heat this is an amazing total for heat and lights, etc. for November in northern, mountainous PA.
*  The credit card was only up $38.05.  Seeing as it's the Holidays that practically being the same as last month.  ;-)
*  The medical co-pay bills went down by $718.64 in November.

HERE are the BAD THINGS(and the not so bad)
.
*  The gas card bill went up $49.03 from last month.
*  There were two irregular bill expenses--two store credit card bills totaling $185.35 which were paid in full.

The Bad List was nice and short this month.  8-)

The Food Budget costs for November are in another post, which is located  HERE.  I stayed under my $300 budgeted amount(on this report grocery money comes out of "Cash")on that expense.
Plus I included some spending for the Food Bank donation in those monies so a Win/Win.

November was a fairly inexpensive month for us, but not the least expensive for 2015. Cheapest bill month's for us so far in 2015 are July, November, February and April from 1st to 4th respectively. These are typically the months we don't pay the irregular expenses in so that makes perfect sense, right? ;-)

The 2015 TOTAL.....
With 11 months accounted for, our Savings Challenge Grand Total for 2015 is $38,451.79.
That savings amount averages $3,495.61 a month put into savings so far. 

We have well surpassed our $28K Savings Goal by $10K+ at this point in the year.
And there is one more month left to save some more though I don't expect to be able to shove much more into my goal for 2015 since we need to keep some of the December savings in reserve to put toward high medical deductibles which reset in January.  8-(
It would be "nice" however to be able to sock away another $1,548.21 into the 2015 Savings Challenge in December.  That would give us a total of $40 Thousand saved this year.
I like nice round figures, don't you? 8-)

Final thoughts on November---
More monthly bills were down rather than up this month and we kept our usual monthly costs fairly low.  Not bare bones low but still pretty low.

THOUGHTS going forward into December----

I'll have a $467+ co-pay from my first cataract surgery to pay as the insurance company finally sent the dr. a payment leaving me on the hook for another $467+. sigh.  But this is the last of the cataract surgery bills and I am NOT looking back! lolz
Same eye doctor's office screwed up Hubs bill which came last week to the tune of a $185 overcharge.  It is suppose to be about $31. Yikes!  The billing department was contacted and they are sending out a new invoice with the correct amount.  But still that's almost $500 more in medical co-pays(over and above our usual prescription & DME co-pays for a month)that are due in December plus about $40 in Physical Therapy co-pays which the bill for the PT should be arriving soon too.

As for the holidays, most everything is already bought and paid for, from gifts to traveling arrangements and will appear on the December c/c statement and then I need to write a few checks.
The credit card bill is paid in full each cycle so there will be no January c/c hangover nor any interest paid on any Holiday gifts.

With 11 months behind us we have surpassed our savings goal in 2015 by a wide margin!
Even so, I am NOT letting up on socking cash away for the last 1 month of the year.  Expenses in December should be about average for us so we will have some leftover money come Dec. 31st.

But with the 2016 high medical deductibles kicking in Jan. 1st I am unsure how much we'll be able to put toward the Savings Challenge in December.  I like to carryover at least $1K of any leftover $ from December into January to put toward those insurance costs.  I am guessing I'll have about $1000? more to put toward the Savings Challenge next month.  Not sure but come back next month to see how it turned out.

So how was your November financially?
  

Did you spend less than the income you had in November?
Did you stay within your budget or not?
What did you do with any money leftover at the end of the month?
Did you pay off any debts or put extra toward your mortgage principle or into savings, in an emergency fund or a retirement account?
Or did you blow it on a want?

If you posted your financial progress on your own blog, leave a link in the comments so we can go check out your progress too and celebrate or commiserate with you!

Sluggy

$28K Savings Challenge......July Update

Every year I keep a close eye on our monthly expenses and our monthly income.

Our income is mainly the salary my Hubs draws from his job.  We have money taken off each paycheck from the top to put into savings, before we even get our hands on it.  This money that's taken goes into various pots....life insurance, health insurance premiums, long term care insurance premiums, investments and retirement savings.  It's automatic so we are never tempted to NOT put it into savings or these other categories.

Once the automatic savings amounts, plus taxes and medical/dental/vision premiums are taken out, it leaves what we get to "live on".  From this amount we budget for bills, both monthly and irregular bills(semi-annual, annual etc.) and our variable bills(like food, eating out, clothing  etc.)  Anything left over once our monthly expenses are paid, I put aside into an interest bearing Savings Challenge account. 

For 2015 I am continuing my Yearly Savings Challenge.  I am raising the Goal amount slightly to $28,000 this year, $4K more than my goal for last year.

On to the July report.....

I have posted my July End of Month $28K $AVING$ CHALLENGE Totals.
Check out the Savings Challenge page tab at the top of the blog for the specific numbers HERE.

I have 2 goals each month.....
The 1st is to actually finish each month in the black and not the red.
The 2nd is to hit the targeted savings amount of $2,333.33.

I have to report that we finished up July with a lovely amount of $.
The extra amount we ended the month of July with?.......$4,089.56

Income

We had $3933.47 left over from our income after our monthly expenses were deducted.
 

Other monies received in July totaled $156.09.  This included interest made on non-retirement accounts and a per diem from Hub's work.

This brought us to our gain of $4089.56
Since we have no debt, this goes into savings.

Outgo

As for the expenses this July, here are the good and the bad side of things....

HERE are the GOOD THINGS

 

*  Phone charges and internet  were approximately the same as last month.
*  The gas credit card went down $85.41.  Hubs didn't buy gas at the Sunoco station because it was so high last month there, even with his .5¢ discount.  He put most gas charges on the reg. credit card and bought at a non-Sunoco station.  This credit card earns us point we can cash in for gift card.
*  The credit card charges went down by $2873.  There was no vacation spending on it plus we put very few charges on it before it closed mid July.

 

HERE are the BAD THINGS(and the not so bad)
.
*  Water bill went up by $10.63.
*  Electricity bill went up by $11.51(A bit more a/c used and the washer/dryer were run more with an extra person here.).
*  The cash withdrawals went up $326.52 due to using cash for some of the apartment hunting trip expenses and I bought a $100 Rite-Aid gift card this month.

 

The Food Budget costs for July are in another post, which is located HERE .

July has been out "cheapest" month so far in 2015.  Our expenses in July came to only $2200.00.
And that was even with a few out of the ordinary expenses(a Sam's club c/c charge, some medical co-pays, buying a gift card and paying the garbage bill ahead for the last 6 months of 2015.  These all came out to about $700+/- beyond our normal monthly costs.
 

The 2015 TOTAL.....
With 7 months accounted for, our Savings Challenge Grand Total for 2015 is $22,886.92.
That averages $3269.56 a month put into savings so far. 
We have left $5,113.08 to put away this year to reach our $28K Goal.

With $22886.92 saved already we only need to put away $1,022.62 each of the next 5 months to reach the $28K goal for the year and that's very doable for us.  ;-)

Finally thoughts on July---

I am amazed at how fast we've been able to pile up the extra/unspent $ this year!  It helped that in April we had that third paycheck.....this always builds our momentum and when it comes early in the year it gets me revved up to keep going.
July was NOT a third paycheck month but even so by not putting charges from mid May to mid July on the c/c we were able to keep the bills somewhat low.  Not having any car repairs last month also helped in that regard.
I am stoked to only be $5K+ away from reaching this savings goal for 2015.


THOUGHTS going forward into August----

As for irregular expenses.....
We have both the house insurance and $695 of car insurance due the end of August.
There are no trips planned this month, except for a one day trek to take College Boy back to school.  We will be renting a van for that trip so there is some expense for that.
The credit card bill is going to top out at around $1900 by the time it closes next Tuesday.  Yikes!  I blame eating out(both traveling and having kids home to visit in July expenses)plus a little retail therapy(mostly Hubs and getting a few things for College Boy before he heads back to school).

The last big irregular expenses coming is end of September and that is the school tax bill(local property taxes here are broken up into a school tax bill and a local tax bill).  I pay one in March and the other in September.  If we can keep the c/c spending down for the rest of the year we are golden for making our savings goal this year. 8-)

With 7 months behind us we have $22,886.92 down and $5,113.08 left to save in 2015. 

 

So how was your July financially?
  

Did you spend less than the income you had in July?
Did you stay within your budget or not?
What did you do with any money leftover at the end of the month?
Did you pay off any debts or put extra toward your mortgage principle or into savings, in an emergency fund or a retirement account?
Or did you blow it on a want?
 

If you posted your financial progress on your own blog, leave a link in the comments so we can go check out your progress too and celebrate or commiserate with you!

Sluggy

$28K Savings Challenge......June Update

Every year I keep a close eye on our monthly expenses and our monthly income.

Our income is mainly the salary my Hubs draws from his job.  We have money taken off each paycheck from the top to put into savings, before we even get our hands on it.  This money that's taken goes into various pots....life insurance, health insurance premiums, long term care insurance premiums, investments and retirement savings.  It's automatic so we are never tempted to NOT put it into savings or these other categories.

Once the automatic savings amounts, plus taxes and medical/dental/vision premiums are taken out, it leaves what we get to "live on".  From this amount we budget for bills, both monthly and irregular bills(semi-annual, annual etc.) and our variable bills(like food, eating out, clothing  etc.)  Anything left over once our monthly expenses are paid, I put aside into an interest bearing Savings Challenge account. 

For 2015 I am continuing my Yearly Savings Challenge.  I am raising the Goal amount slightly to $28,000 this year, $4K more than my goal for last year.

On to the June report.....

I have posted my May End of Month $28K $AVING$ CHALLENGE Totals.
Check out the Savings Challenge page tab at the top of the blog for the specific numbers HERE.

I have 2 goals each month.....
The 1st is to actually finish each month in the black and not the red.
The 2nd is to hit the targeted savings amount of $2,333.33.

I have to report that we finished up June with a smaller amount of leftover cash.
The extra amount we ended the month of June with?.......$1,369.37

Income

We had $1,143.02 left over from our income after our monthly expenses were deducted.
 

Other monies received in June totaled $226.35.  This included interest made on non-retirement accounts, 2 dividend checks and a per diem from Hub's work.

This brought us to our gain of $1,369.37
Since we have no debt, this goes into savings.

Outgo

As for the expenses this June, here are the good and the bad side of things....

HERE are the GOOD THINGS

 

*  Phone charges, internet and  electricity were approximately the same as last month.
*  Cash withdrawals went down a crazy $936.52 from May's total.  Vacation $ mostly.

 

HERE are the BAD THINGS
.
*  The credit card bill was $2,445.89 higher(May's trip expenses).
*  We had a car repair of $441.61 on College Boy's vehicle.
*  Water bill went up by $7.16
*  Gas card bill went up by $87.27(May's trip).

 

The Food Budget costs for June are in another post, which is located HERE .
 

The 2015 TOTAL.....
With 6 months accounted for, our Savings Challenge Grand Total for 2015 is $18,797.36.
That averages $3,132.89 a month put into savings so far. 
We have left $9,202.64 to put away this year to reach our $28K Goal.

With $18797.36 saved already we only need to put away $1,533.77 each of the next 6 months to reach the $28K goal for the year and that's highly doable for us.  ;-)

THOUGHTS going forward into July----

No irregular bills coming in July, which is good.
The only trip planned this month is a 2 day apartment hunting excursion to VA so a few extra bills(hotel, gas, food out) for that.
There are eye surgery co-pays and prescription co-pays which I will pay for OOP instead of the HSA in July which should amount to about $300+/-.  Hubs also has some eye issues and co-pays this month which I don't have a handle on the amount yet.

We are having a cook-out picnic for July 4th, then the eldest son will be home for a bit later in the month, so there will be extra food/drink spending in July(but I am stocked up on many items for this so I don't anticipate going over my food budget this month).

With 6 months behind us we have $18,797.36 down and $9202.64 left to save in 2015. 

 

So how was your June financially?
  

Did you spend less than the income you had in June?
Did you stay within your budget or not?
What did you do with any money leftover at the end of the month?
Did you pay off any debts or put extra toward your mortgage principle or into savings, in an emergency fund or a retirement account?
Or did you blow it on a want?
 

If you posted your financial progress on your own blog, leave a link in the comments so we can go check out your progress too and celebrate or commiserate with you!

Sluggy

$28K Savings Challenge......April Update

Every year I keep a close eye on our monthly expenses and our monthly income.

Our income is mainly the salary my Hubs draws from his job.  We have money taken off each paycheck from the top to put into savings, before we even get our hands on it.  This money that's taken goes into various pots....life insurance, health insurance premiums, long term care insurance premiums, investments and retirement savings.  It's automatic so we are never tempted to NOT put it into savings or these other categories.

Once the automatic savings amounts, plus taxes and medical/dental/vision premiums are taken out, it leaves what we get to "live on".  From this amount we budget for bills, both monthly and irregular bills(semi-annual, annual etc.) and our variable bills(like food, eating out, clothing  etc.)  Anything left over once our monthly expenses are paid, I put aside into an interest bearing Savings Challenge account. 

For 2015 I am continuing my Yearly Savings Challenge.  I am raising the Goal amount slightly to $28,000 this year, $4K more than my goal for last year.

On to the April report.....

I have posted my April End of Month $28K $AVING$ CHALLENGE Totals.
Check out the Savings Challenge page tab at the top of the blog for the specific numbers HERE.

I have 2 goals each month.....
The 1st is to actually finish each month in the black and not the red.
The 2nd is to hit the targeted savings amount of $2,333.33.

I have to report that we finished up April with a HUGE amount of leftover cash.
The extra amount we ended the month of April with?.......$6,343.83

Income

We had $6,207.11 left over from our income after our monthly expenses were deducted.
 

Other monies received in April totaled $136.72.  This included interest made on non-retirement accounts.

This brought us to our gain of $6343.83
Since we have no debt, this goes into savings.

Outgo

As for the expenses this April, here are the good and the bad side of things....

HERE are the GOOD THINGS

 

*  Phone charges, internet and  were approximately the same as last month.
*  Electric bill went down $150.88 from March's bill because of a decrease in heating.
*  Cash withdrawals went down by $230.48
 

HERE are the BAD THINGS
.
*  Water bill was up $12.37 from March's bill.  Don't know why.
*  We had 1 irregular bill from a dental visit.
*  Gas card bill went up $100.12 from March's bill.  2 round trips worth of gasoline to College Boy's school and Hubs putting most of his gas spending on this c/c rather than our other c/c.

*  The credit card bill was up $886.86 from March's statement.  Almost $800 of this increase was for prepaid hotel charges for our May trip.  While I didn't like seeing that big c/c bill it's nice to know that once we get home from our trip a sizeable chunk of vacation charges will already be paid. ;-)
 

The Food Budget costs for April are in another post, which is located HERE.  I actually came in under budget on food/toiletries for April.....well, $1.41 over. ;-)
 

The 2015 TOTAL.....
With 4 months accounted for, our Savings Challenge Grand Total for 2015 is $15,039.21.
That averages $3,759.80+ a month so far and is about $1,426.47 more than we need to put away every month to reach the $28K goal for the year.

THOUGHTS going forward into May----

Irregular bills coming in May......semi-annual car insurance bill comes due for our 2 main cars.  This comes to about $1500 a year now.  The bill for the spare car(for College Boy to use while home)comes due in August so we won't worry about that one now.
I am figuring our "nut" this month will be about $2,500 unless we purchase a freezer in the next week which increases our credit card bill for May.


With 4 months behind us we have $15039.21 down and $12,960.79 left to save in 20015.  That means we are over HALWAY to our yearly goal.  The amount left to save breaks down into $1,620.10 per month for the next 8 months of the year. I think we can easily do this number each month.
 

 

So how was your April financially?
  

Did you spend less than the income you had in April?
Did you stay within your budget or not?
What did you do with any money leftover at the end of the month?
Did you pay off any debts or put extra toward your mortgage principle or into savings in an emergency fund or a retirement account?
Or did you blow it on something you wanted?
 

If you posted your financial progress on your own blog, leave a link in the comments so we can go check out your progress too and celebrate with you or commiserate with you!

Sluggy